


Never Alone

by GerdavR



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Blood and Gore, Body Horror, Character Death, F/M, Kylo Ren is the villain, evil Sith relic, halloween fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-28
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-08 21:20:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 16,888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27253333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GerdavR/pseuds/GerdavR
Summary: Rose and Rey are held captive by the First Order. When a Force ritual goes wrong, Rose must work with her enemies to escape a terrible Sith monster.Can she find Rey and escape from the FO ship? And can she rely on the help of a certain redhead General?
Relationships: Armitage Hux/Rose Tico
Comments: 79
Kudos: 67





	1. Cella

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this fic for Gingerrose Halloween 2020! :3  
> Many thanks to my great beta [Brit](https://archiveofourown.org/users/birchwoods01/pseuds/Brit%20Hux-Tico)!

Rose stared at her hands. They weren’t pretty. Short fingers, palms full of calluses and old cuts where her grip had slipped when using the hydrospanner, short, chewed off nails. She sighed and leaned against the wall of her cell, rubbing her wrists where there were bruises from the binders. It hurt, burned slightly when she brushed against the grazed skin, but she couldn’t stop touching it.

She had no idea how long she had been in this cell, a couple of days, judging by the frequency of her meals—provided that they fed her three times a day that would make it… four days?

She put her hands in her lap and looked at the dark cell door. Dark door, dark floor, and dark walls. If she didn’t know that the First Order flagship looked like that in every corridor and in every hangar she would have thought they had designed the cell to suck out the will of the inmates, making them despair in the face of darkness.

But that was who the Order was—lurking in the darkness, born in the shadowed edges of the galaxy. If only Finn were here… had he felt the same when he was facing the dark rooms with their impossibly perfect, polished floors? 

A couple of days ago she would have thought that she could simply ask him after she got out of here, after Poe, Finn and Chewie busted her and Rey out of here. But now she wasn’t so sure anymore. She reached out for her Otomok medallion, which hung on a thin chain around her neck, automatically, for comfort. She was all alone.

Kriff! They had known that it was a long shot… meeting with an alleged spy. But not only did their meeting never happen, a First Order patrol detected them before they could even land on Taris.

And she had been completely useless! Stars only know why General Organa had insisted that she go on the mission with Rey. Rose wasn’t a soldier, only some stupid grease monkey.

Rose let go of her medallion. She pulled her hair tie out of her hair and started to stretch it, picking out the loose hairs wrapped around the elastic band.

Their mission had failed. Failed… despite their best efforts. Her thoughts returned to the odd, blank expression on Rey’s face when they were picked up. It was as if she was absent-minded.

Rey had told her that she had dreamed a lot about a dark tunnel lately, the dream had been so intense that Rey had barely slept after waking up from the nightmares.

Rose exhaled. Stars, she was scared, bored, and exhausted at the same time. If only they had put her in a cell with Rey. But nobody had talked to her—considering the interrogation tactics the Order employed it was probably a stroke of luck, but then she could’ve at least asked about Rey.

She scoffed at herself and pulled her hair together with the hair tie. As if they would answer her questions. The Stormtrooper who brought her food hadn’t even looked at her when he threw the bowl with some kind of oatmeal on the floor.

A shiver ran down her spine and she shuddered. It was cold, she realised. Odd, since when was it cold in a starship? If anything it was too warm from all that filtered air. She rubbed her arms. Perhaps there was a malfunction in the A/C? From what she had seen, the Order was using state of the art tech, probably a K-le48 AC with integrated—

A tremble was running through the room, no, through the ship. Rose sat up straighter. This was an Executioner-class super-dreadnought—a ship of this size wouldn’t simply tremble. Unless it was under attack! Rose jumped up and went to the door, pressing her ear against the slick covering. There it was again, a very faint rumble. Yes, they were under attack—there simply was no other explanation.

She heard heavy footsteps run past the cell, muffled through the thick layers of durasteel. Then silence. “The kriff?” she mumbled. Now that she thought about it—the Resistance didn’t have enough firepower left after Crait to stage a frontal attack on the First Order’s flagship. A smile spread out on her lips—it had to be Rey!

Yes! Certainly she had managed to escape and was causing these explosions with the Force or something! Or this was a distraction from Finn and Poe, an attempt to get them off the ship!

Rose pressed her ear again to the door. To her frustration, she couldn’t hear a thing. She groaned in frustration and started to pace in her cell. Damn it, she wanted to help but it was clear that she was stuck until they rescued her. On her next rough exhale, she noticed that a cloud of breath formed—had they taken out the heater? But that didn’t make sense; non-military systems didn’t run through the main power-nodes. An explosion there would hardly make sense.

She continued to pace back and forth and rubbed her arms. Argh, she wanted to know what was going on! Either way it’s got to be good news if the Order was in trouble. She heard more footsteps pass her cell; faint screams could be heard.

Rose frowned. Another tremor shook her cell and more screams could be heard—but it wasn’t a command or a threat, it sounded like someone howling in agony. Suddenly, the scream cut off. Kriff. This didn’t sound good.

Another scream rang out, this time closer than before. Somebody was in pain; Rose clenched her fists. Kriff.

Footsteps approached her cell and stopped. Her breath hitched—this was it. Despite the noise and the rumbling she couldn’t help but smile nervously. It had to be Rey who was busting her out!

The door slid open and a Stormtrooper and two First Order officers stumbled in, bumping into her. The Stormtrooper fell on the floor; her helmet came off and the first thing Rose noticed was the look of pure terror that was on her face.

She jerked her head up, only to see how one of the officers who was wearing a greatcoat was hammering on the door button until it slid shut again. He locked the door and took a step back from it. He held his blaster in his right hand; they all panted for breath.

Rose frowned. What the-

Then she heard heavy footsteps outside. No, not footsteps… it sounded like somebody was dragging a heavy sack, but pausing before moving on.

She drew breath to say something, but the officer who had closed the door heard the intake of breath and spun around, lifting his finger to his lips. Rose blanched, it was none other than General Hux himself. He looked terrified, eyes wide and sweat covering his forehead, his usually slicked back hair was falling into his eyes.

She closed her mouth again and stared past Hux at the door. It was colder than before, or was it just her imagination? It was quiet outside, too quiet. She listened closely, then she heard it: whispers so sharp and hissing that she couldn’t understand the words. But she was pretty sure that she heard more than one voice.

Then the steps resumed; slowly, very slowly they receded. The dark-haired pale-skinned officer exhaled and wiped over his face. The Stormtrooper stumbled on her feet reaching for her helmet, putting it on before Rose had a chance to really see her face—from what she could see she was a young olive-skinned woman with a large FO tattoo inked on her neck.

“What’s going on?” whispered Rose.

Hux glared at her, trying to slick his hair back. He huffed and turned his attention to the officer. “Lieutenant Mitaka, do you still have your blaster?”

He shook his head, looking miserable. “No, sir. I lost it when-” he broke off.

To Rose’s surprise Hux gulped and said “No matter, from what we have seen conventional weapons proved to be ineffective.”

Rose stepped in front of Hux; she barely reached his chest but she lifted her chin defiantly. “What is going on, Hux?”

He bent down. “That’s _General_ Hux to you, Sergeant Tico.”

“Really? Shit is obviously going down and you pull rank on me?”

Hux pressed his lips together before he answered. “If you must know the cause of our death: it’s of course Ren with some bloody Sith Relic from Exegol.” He holstered his weapon.

“Sith Relic? What about Rey—”

“All I know is that Ren attempted some Sith ritual in his chambers. Apparently that fool managed to let loose a Sith monster that is now wreaking havoc throughout the whole ship.”

Rose searched Hux’s face for a hint that he was making it up, but he looked candid. “Apparently? You don’t know for sure?”

Mitaka cleared his throat. “It’s interfering with the power nodes, causing black-outs. It moves only in the dark, so we- we haven’t seen it. Only parts… it’s big and t-twisted. It’s killing us faster than we can deploy reinforcements.”

Rose gulped. “The screams…” Nobody deserved that, not even the First Order.

Hux grimaced. “Audio reports indicate that it’s some kind of animal, mutilating and devouring anyone and anything that crosses its way.”

A Sith monster? They needed Rey—surely she could fight it with the Force. Rose looked from Hux to Mitaka and to the Stormtrooper. What now? Well, whatever was going on outside, it had to be something big for General kriffing Hux to stumble in here like he did.

She couldn’t possibly defeat that thing or even get out of the cell without help. She was no hero. “We need to find Rey.”

Hux rolled his eyes. “I swear if I have to hear one more time about that Scavenger I’ll feed you to that thing outside.”

She put her hands on her hips. “We need her if we are to fight that monster, pal! You said yourself that weapons don’t work on it—so we need the Force.”

He crooked an eyebrow. “I haven’t heard from Ren, so I don’t assume that a Force user is a match for the beast.”

“Well, Ren is not Rey—she’s way stronger than he is.”

Hux sneered. “I agree. But I won’t bet my life on mystical nonsense if we have science.”

“An average X9 blaster bolt has 6.77 trillion watts, you say it didn’t stop it? Even a blaster rifle—”

“—has 7.22 trillion watts! I wasn’t talking about a simple upgrade, Sergeant! Empirical evidence suggests that it doesn’t like light so it stands to reason that it’s vulnerable to light itself or UV rays.”

Uh, he was actually right. “Maybe, but Rey’s still the best fighter I have ever seen.”

“Her whereabouts are currently unknown,” snapped Hux. “Ren and his knights were keeping her guarded; he told me that ‘regular soldiers’ wouldn’t be able to handle her.”

Rose registered from the corner of her eye how the Stormtrooper shifted a little.

“So? What’s the plan?” Rose asked.

“Plan? You will stay confined to this cell of course, there is no point in—”

“There are only three of you, you think you can sneak to the engine room to reroute power without people who know what they’re doing? How are you supposed to sync the mainframe with the network in time?”

He blinked, clearly taken aback. “You… are an engineer.”

“Damn right I am! Well, I’m a mechanic but I know most systems. And I know the FO network well enough that it’s designed to be operated by a two person team.”

Hux tugged at his black leather glove. “Clearly I underestimated you, Sergeant.” He turned to Mitaka. “We need to get to the secondary bridge in E-deck, Lieutenant.”

“Yes sir!” He visibly pulled himself together. Rose wondered how old he was, he looked as if he was barely of age to be an officer.

“NK-9554, you will cover us,” he handed her his blaster, “rearm yourself with regular weaponry as soon as the opportunity presents itself.”

NK took the blaster and snapped at attention. “Yes sir!”

“I’ll take the lead. Sergeant, you stay close to me. Apparently we’re the only ones with enough expertise to reroute the power to get rid of that beast.”

“Alright, is the grid ZY-100 or 200?”

“200 of course, with an upgraded PABR network.”

Rose nodded. “Impressive.”

Hux straightened his jacket and tried to slick his hair back. “We don’t know the monster’s capabilities so best to assume that it has excellent hearing and sight. We move fast and quiet.”

They all nodded and Hux entered the code to open the door. It slid open with a silent hiss; Rose felt her stomach drop. Stars knew if that thing could hear the hiss or not. Cold air streamed into the room, making her shudder.

Hux peeked around the corner and crept outside, followed by Rose, Mitaka and NK. They sneaked along the hallway back to a junction where only the pale emergency light was on, providing just enough light so that she could see Hux’s figure and bodies of white-clad Stormtroopers laying on the floor. Their limbs were twisted and from what she could see legs; arms were missing.

Rose pressed her lips together and followed Hux further down the hallway. Behind her, she could hear Mitaka breathing loudly; she glanced over her shoulder and saw him with a pained expression on his face. He looked as if he would faint.

Suddenly, Rose bumped into Hux who had stopped dead in his tracks. Her eyes snapped forward and she squinted. Why had he stopped? She didn’t see—

A heavy, dragging footstep could be heard. Then another. Her stomach dropped. Kriff! Why was it here? Wasn’t it supposed to be in the other direction? And where was it exactly?

Hux pressed himself against the wall, almost melting into the dark surroundings with his black uniform, only then she realised that her light brown khaki shirt was standing out in the shade of the corridor—and so would NK’s white armour! If that thing could see them—

Hux grabbed her and pressed her into the wall, his body against hers, covering her with himself, or rather, with his greatcoat. Behind her, Rose heard Mitaka move as well; he was probably following Hux’s example with NK.

Her face was buried in Hux’s chest; the fabric was rough but it was warm from his body heat. She could smell his scent: tea, leather and soap.

Again she could hear the stomping, faint whispering could be heard. No, not whispers. The monster wasn’t whispering, was it? It had to be some kind of hissing noise. Then the slurping started and Rose began to tremble, it was— it was drinking the blood of its victims.

Stars! Rey! Please, Rey—she had to come! Rose had no idea how long they stood there, pressed against the wall, waiting for the creature to disappear into the darkness.

When Hux finally moved away from her, they all sagged with relief. Only now she realised that Hux was shaking too. He wiped over his face and managed to limp to a door on their left, quickly typing some code into the panel. The door slid open and they all hurried inside; Rose could feel how weak her knees were. As soon as NK had entered, Hux closed the door again.

Rose noticed that they were in some kind of office: there was a small desk and a few chairs in it.

Mitaka went into the farthest corner and sat down, pulling his knees up to his chest. NK handed Hux his blaster back and started to inspect a blaster rifle she had apparently picked up in one of the hallways.

Stars! Rose hadn’t even thought about getting a weapon! Stupid! How else was she supposed to escape? She rubbed her cold arms. First things first, she wouldn’t get very far on her own—not with a blood-sucking, flesh-eating monster lurking around. Her best shot was to wait until they had gotten rid of it and then make a run for it. If she was lucky, she would find Rey along the way and they could escape together.

Her throat was parched and she went to the desk to see if there was something to drink there. She noticed that Hux was eyeing her, but he didn’t say anything, probably still too exhausted from the ordeal to bark orders at her.

She found a bottle with water and two glasses on a sideboard. She screwed it open and took a gulp without bothering with the glasses. She wiped over her mouth and went to Mitaka, handing him the bottle.

“You don’t look so well, perhaps water will help a bit.”

He frowned a little but then he took it and unscrewed it before taking a gulp. Suddenly his eyes went wide and he put the bottle down, wiped the opening with his sleeve and got up to approach Hux who was sitting on a chair next to the table.

“Sir, I apologize—have some water.” He put the bottle on the table and went to get a glass.

Rose almost groaned. They were being chased by a Force forsaken abomination and the First Oder was still all about bowing and scraping to superior officers.

Hux waited until Mitaka had poured him a glass and quickly drank it. Then he rolled his shoulders back. “You are allowed to ignore regulation 3453, Private.”

NK hesitated for a moment, then she took her helmet off. Rose couldn’t help but stare at her, how she stripped out of the Stormtrooper armour until she was only wearing long sleeved black undergarment. Even without the armour she looked strong and sturdy, and tall.Hux got up and handed her the bottle. “We need to move fast, I trust that the blaster rifle is functional?”

“Yes sir! Ready to blast that thing off your ship!” NK almost looked excited.

Rose watched Hux and NK with a frown. It made sense to ditch the white armour, but Rose had to admit that she hadn’t thought that Hux would actually be flexible enough to take that measure. She started to unbutton her shirt, the cold air gave her goosebumps—her t-shirt was white too she realised, kriff. She hadn’t thought about that. Stupid!

Well, at least her bra was black. Should she just go for it? But then again it was pretty freezing and she needed her fingers to be nimble and not clammy from the cold.

“Of all the indignant…” mumbled Hux and shook his greatcoat off. He pulled the corners of his mouth down and quickly opened his uniform jacket, shrugged it off and threw it at Rose.

She caught it and gaped at him. He looked slender without the rectangle uniform jacket, but he wasn’t skinny. She noticed lean muscles on his upper arms. There were two black stripes inked on his left forearm.

He tugged at his black t-shirt before he grabbed his greatcoat. “As already said, we need to move fast and ideally you won’t freeze until we reach the secondary bridge.” He slid into his coat.

Rose wasn’t thrilled to wear it but she put the jacket on. It was too large for her, but at least it was warm. Again she noticed the smell of tea and soap; the jacket still had his scent.

NK drank from the bottle and kept looking at her discarded armour. Finn had told her that being without the armour at first it had felt foreign, eventually he had gotten used to it. Perhaps it was the same for NK?

Rose licked her lips. “Are you alright?”

NK frowned. “Don’t talk to me, scum.”

Hux exhaled and checked his holo. “We need to get to the next deck in order to reach our goal.”

Rose rolled the sleeves of the jacket up, they were too long for her. “Where is the secondary bridge exactly, Hux?”

“You- you will address the General properly, R- Rebel Scum,” said Mitaka.

Rose crooked an eyebrow and scoffed. “We have other worries now.”

Hux lifted his hand to placate him. “Don’t waste your breath, Lieutenant. Rebels have no sense of order and rank.”

Rose didn’t dignify that with a response.


	2. Biomolecule

The hallway was dark and empty; the dim emergency light was blinking. Apparently, there were fluctuations even in the back-up system. Hux had taken point again, Rose followed him. Behind her she could hear Mitaka and NK.

Hm, fluctuations in the back-up system… how was this even possible? The Order would surely utilize a double generator system with a separate power grid. With the money they had they had something along the lines of a CR-2435 that—

Her thoughts were interrupted when Hux slowed down until he stopped. All Rose could hear were their breathing. She squinted but couldn’t see far enough to determine what had caused Hux to halt.

She looked around; the hallway was dark and empty like— wait a moment! They had passed quite a few bodies before they had rested in that small office. And since they had gotten out she hadn’t seen any. A shudder ran down her spine when she remembered the smacking and slurping from the monster. Kriff! Had it eaten _all_ of them?

She jerked her head forward, staring at Hux’s back. Had he noticed too? Should she tell him? She lifted her hand and put it on his back. He glanced over his shoulder, something unreadable in his gaze.

‘Bodies’ mouthed Rose, ‘gone’.

He nodded and turned his attention again into the hallway in front of them. It was very, very quiet but then she heard it: a soft smack, reminding her of naked feet on a concrete floor. Another light smack, and then another. It didn’t sound like a step, it was much too irregular for that. _Smack_ , _smack_ , _smack_.

There was movement in the dark ahead of them, in the dim flickering light from the ceiling she saw something move, a bulky something. It didn't sound like the monster with its heavy footsteps.

It was moving slowly forward, the first thing she saw was an naked arm, no… three naked arms, looking grey and pale. The thing moved closer to the light, it looked like a pile of rotten corpses wrapped in intestines, moving, breathing and whispering.

There were human heads sticking out of its body—twisted, deformed heads, with empty bleeding eyes, gaping mouths so wide open that they began to tear at the corners. Rose pressed her hand against her mouth, behind her she could hear a muffled gasp.

One of the heads turned in their direction and Rose froze. Kriff! Could they hide in the shadows?

The thing creeped, using its arms and legs to grope its way forward. It looked slow, could they outrun it? Perhaps— Mitaka grabbed her arm, causing her to look at him. Mitaka’s eyes were big, scared, and he looked much younger than before. Her throat laced up when she realised why he had grabbed her. In the far end of the corridor she could see something bulky. Stars! It was another monster, the same misshaped pile of flesh that was in front of them. She quickly put her hand on Hux’s back, pressing hard. Annoyed, he made eye contact with her; she pointed backwards and forward and made a pincer movement.

Hux blanched. He craned his neck to see behind them, probably to confirm what she had gestured to him.

NK and Mitaka were now looking at him, probably waiting for orders. Rose gritted her teeth, why the kriff hadn't she asked for a weapon? These horrors were surrounding them, and she was at the mercy of her enemies.

Hux gave the others hand signals she didn’t understand—damn! He pulled his blaster out of the holster, readying his weapon. Rose clenched her hands to fists, waiting for the inevitable start of the fight.

Hux started to move forward, trying to stay close to the wall. Rose followed him, feeling as if she was breathing so loudly that it could be heard across the whole ship. As they crept closer to the thing Rose had to suppress the urge to simply run away in face of the deformed pile of limbs, the stench of blood and faeces was almost unbearable, the foul smell of death was getting more intense as they approached it.

One of the heads jerked around and seemed to stare at her with it’s empty eyes, the bloody mouth was opening and closing, its teeth clicking. They kept moving on, perhaps it was blind and deaf?

The mouth opened again and said with a very brittle voice: “M—Mitaka, don’t leave me.”

Rose didn’t even think, she just took hold of Mitaka’s hand and pressed it hard. By the stars! Don’t answer! Don’t ans—

“Zala?” asked Mitaka in a weak voice.

The misshapen creature replied with a hiss. The head that had spoken tore its eyes wide open, almost making the bloody eyes roll back in its head. A single blaster shot rang out and dark-red blood seeped out of a hole in its forehead.

“Run!” Hux jumped up and ran down the hallway, past the monster. NK fired a slave of shots into the meaty body of the creature, some of the intestines burst, causing it to howl and hiss even louder as blood and something that looked like stomach acid seeped on the floor. Hux stopped in front of a small, inconspicuous door and frantically started to type a code into the panel.

“Give me the blaster, damn it!” screamed Rose.

The creature had obviously been hurt, it was bleeding and howling. Despite its appearance it was rather fast, dragging its body across the floor with loud smacking noises, fingernails scraping over the polished floor.

NK was standing in front of them, firing non-stop. With a hiss, the door finally slid open and Hux grabbed Rose by the collar and shoved her inside. She stumbled and fell on her knee. Before she could get up Mitaka fell on her, knocking her flat on her stomach. She tried to crawl away, but another weight knocked the air out of her lungs and a sharp pain burned on her face, making her eyes water.

With horror she saw through the veil of tears how a twisted, grey arm grabbed the doorway. She heard blaster shots and the arm was severed before the door slid close.

Thuds could be heard as the creature pounded against the durasteel door. The weight was lifted from her and she sat up, coughing. The coppery taste of blood was in her mouth and she wiped over her face, the sleeve was bloody.

The First Order soldiers backed away from the door, NK pulled Rose back on her feet with one arm. Stars, she was strong! She sniffled. “Enforced durasteel?”

Mitaka nodded. “Of course it is!”

Rose stared at the severed arm; it was still twitching. She wiped again with a trembling hand over her face. “It—it recognized you.”

NK stepped on the hand and squashed it until it was still. “I think it was Lieutenant Yur, or rather what was left of her. I recognized her blonde hair.”

Hux stared at the hand on the floor. “This is worse than I thought. If that thing is sentient, there is no telling what it will do next. We can only hope that it doesn’t remember the access codes.”

As if on cue the pounding stopped and they could hear beeping noises from outside. Rose froze. It sounded like it was using the panel next to the door. “Kriff!”

“It can’t override my command codes,” said Hux. “At least not yet.”

NK frowned. “Sir?”

“If it can absorb knowledge then it’s possible that it will learn codes from high ranking officers,” replied Hux.

Rose ran her hand through her hair, attempting to ignore her smarting nose. “We need to think about our next steps carefully. Where is this ship headed?”

Hux pursed his lips. “To the Mantellian shipyards. To rendez-vous with the fleet. Obviously we have to deal with this… infestation before we reach our destination.”

Mitaka gulped. “Surely the Supreme Leader can”

“He was the one that unleashed that thing… or these things,” interjected Hux. “I assume he’s no longer alive.”

Mitaka lifted his chin. “We don’t know that, sir.”

“No, we don’t. But the comm is offline due to the interference that creature caused. We have to form a plan without counting on,” Hux huffed, “the _Force_ , Lieutenant.”

An idea was forming in the back of Rose’s mind… it wasn’t a simple beast. At least not in all its actions. It had a purpose. “We need to find out what it’s up to. We already know that it's got to be vulnerable to heat and light. Why else would it mess with the systems? But what if that’s not all?”

Hux rubbed his chin. “Indeed.”

NK shifted her weight from one leg to another, she looked like she wanted to say something but she just frowned. Were all the Stormtroopers so expressive under their helmets? Rose sniffled again, the pain in her nose was slowly receding. “NK? You got something?”

“No.” She looked contrite.

Rose sighed. “Come on, it’s just the four of us!”

Hux crooked an eyebrow. “Is this how your precious General Organa leads? By asking mere footsoldiers for advice?”

“The way I see it we all need to put our heads together to figure this out. We all know jack shit about what’s happening.” She puffed herself up. “If I can work with you, Hux, you damn well should be able to listen to your own soldiers.”

Hux pressed his lips together and eyed Mitaka. Mitaka turned to NK. “Anything to report, Trooper?”

NK snapped in parade rest, shouldering her blaster rifle. “Sir! This is not the creature my squad first encountered in the inner sanctuary.”

Mitaka exchanged looks with Hux. Finally Hux cleared his throat. “Please elaborate.”

“I didn’t get a good look at it, but it was fast, so fast that it ripped through half of my squad before we even saw it. It was black and it— it looked like it was floating.”

Rose gaped at her. “Floating? Like in the air?”

NK ignored her and stared at Hux. He sighed. “Answer the question, NK-9554.”

She snapped at attention. “Sir! I can’t answer the question. I barely got a glimpse of it, but I know that it was faster than that meat mountain outside that door.”

Rose let those words sink in. Damn it! If only Rey were here! She could cut through every monster she laid her eyes on! How in the galaxy was she supposed to— Calm, she had to calm down and think. Brute force obviously wouldn’t help against the monsters.

Hux tugged at his glove and clasped his hands behind his back. “At ease, NK-9554.”

“Sir!” NK relaxed into parade rest.

“I guess we still need to get to the secondary bridge,” said Rose. “But at least we now know for sure that a frontal attack won’t work.”

NK frowned, looked shortly at Hux and then she huffed. “A full squadron with X2 plasma rifles could pulverize any living and breathing thing.”

X2? Ridiculous! Just as Rose wanted to disagree, Hux spoke up: “I’m afraid that even a modified X2 with an additional plasma load wouldn’t reload fast enough to slow down the creature, especially if it's moving fast.”

Rose nodded. “Exactly. Even with a scattershot it won’t penetrate the thick layers of— of flesh fast enough. And explosives are out of the question on a starship with that much power nodes.”

“You know about our power nodes?” asked Hux.

“Yeah, well—it’s got to be a dense grid with YS-chip modules, right?”

Hux squinted. “Where did you get this information?”

“Duh, I’ve got two eyes and I saw the ventral cannons' energy output.” She cleared her throat. “Doesn’t matter now. How do we get to the bridge?”

Mitaka looked confused. “You— you don’t get to ask questions, uh, Rebel scum.”

Rose scoffed. “No time for this formal talk. Chop, chop—let’s get going!”

Hux sighed. “Tsk, no sense for propriety at all. I concur on your sense of time though. We need to contain this outbreak post-haste.”

Rose scanned the room with her eyes, it was a little storage room. It didn’t look like there was any other exit than the door guarded by the monster. “Okay, how do we get out of here?”

Hux blushed a little. “We need to look for the ventilation shaft, it has to be hidden behind one of these panels.”

***

They split up and it took them a couple of minutes before Mitaka found it. It didn’t help that they could hear the creature outside the door, beeping away on the panel with increasingly fast movements, whispering and moaning something intelligible.

Mitaka put the dark, metallic panel on the floor and gazed inside the shaft. It was full of cables and left only a small space to crawl through.

“Any idea where that leads?” asked Rose as she peeked inside. She wasn’t overly fond of small spaces. Even the prospect of being confined in the shaft made her sweat.

Hux leaned over her, she could again smell his scent. “Of course, there is an intersection every hundred meters. We can crawl to intersection B2 and arrive at the lift shaft where we can get down.” Suddenly he seemed to realise how close they were and he pulled back.

Rose swiped her sweaty palms on her trousers. “Okay.” Stars, she really _hated_ narrow spaces!

“Lieutenant Mitaka, you take point—due to your stature you can move faster than NK-9554 and me.”

“Yes sir,” said Mitaka and immediately crawled in.

“NK-9554, you’re next.”

Rose watched her follow Mitaka into the shaft. She gulped. “I’m next I guess.”

“You’re unusually meek, Sergeant Tico.”

Damn it, he had caught on. She took a deep breath and went in. She saw NK’s backside a few meters ahead and tried to control her breathing. Calm, she just had to keep calm. There was nothing to it, the shaft was made out of metal and couldn’t cave. It wasn’t an unstable mine on some backwater planet. No problem, no problem at all. With trembling hands, she grabbed the silver medallion she wore around her neck. If only she wasn’t alone. If only Paige were here.

Her hands were cold from the cool floor and her knees hurt. She was feeling hot, despite shivering from the low temperature. Stars, if felt like they were in that damn shaft for hours. She closed her eyes; calm, she had to stay calm. There was enough air, she could breathe—

“What’s the hold-up?” whispered Hux from behind.

“Nothing,” she hissed and willed her hands and legs to move on.

They reached the junction and climbed down to the lower deck. When they finally exited the tight space, Rose couldn’t help but sit down and bury her face in her hands, gasping for air. She heard Hux exit the shaft and she made an effort to look up, to appear unfazed.

He didn’t even look at her. Instead, he slicked his hair back and had a look around. She pulled herself together and did the same. It was another small-ish room with a few lockers. From the looks of it, it was a changing room of some sorts, probably for the upper brass considering the size and the elegant sinks and shower cubes in the back.

Hux checked his chronometer. “We will take a break here and resume the mission in 30 minutes.”

NK went to the sink and started to drink water from the tap. While watching her, Rose realised that her throat was parched. She went to the other sink and splatted water into her face before starting to drink the cold water.

She wiped her face with her sleeve and sat down on the bench in front of a locker. Mitaka and Hux huddled together looking at a small holo display from Hux’s wrist holo. From what she could see they were looking at ship schematics.

She knew she should get up, join them to be up to speed but her limbs felt heavy, every muscle in her body felt sore and she could feel a head-ache coming on. Crawling through the shaft had zapped her energy more than she had thought. She let her head fall back against the locker and closed her eyes.

She had no time to rest but she needed to gather her strength. Rey had shown her a simple meditation technique that might just do the trick. She pictured a wide grass plain, the tall green grass was swaying in the wind. Rose took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. The sun was shining, it was warm, the wind was mild and brought the smell of fresh cut grass with it. She continued to breathe steadily, she felt the tension in the back of her head fade away.

She walked through the grass, brushing over the blades. She looked at the endless plain and her breathing slowed down. In the horizon she could see … something. She squinted but she didn’t see what it was. She continued to walk toward it and then she recognized a humanoid shape, was it—

Something podded her and she opened her eyes with a start. Hux was standing in front of her. “Finished your nap, Sergeant?” he sneered.

She rubbed over her eyes. Odd, she hadn’t even realised that she had fallen asleep. “I was meditating.”

“Well, while you were meditating, we were busy planning our route.”

She crooked her eyebrow. “What? Did you need my help or something?”

Hux turned the corners of his mouth down. “Of course not!”

“If you want, I can have a look of course—”

“Don’t be ridiculous!” The tips of Hux’s ears turned pink. He turned on his heel and left her.

Heh, that was almost too easy. She got up and stretched a little; she still felt exhausted.

She went to the sink and splashed some more water into her face. In the mirror, she saw Mitaka blinking slowly as if he was tired. Well, at least she wasn’t the only one being worn out.

“So, where to next?” she asked and turned to face Hux.

“The fastest way is through the hallway, until we reach the secondary bridge. But considering that we’re up against an unknown number of hostiles, we’ll take a detour through the mess and then head to the Internal Security office. From there it’s a short trip through the hallway to the bridge.”

Interesting, she hadn’t thought that Hux would play it safe. She had expected him to send NK down the hallway for recon, but then again it made more sense to make sure that their small group wouldn’t be decimated.

She cleared her throat. “Is there any way that I could get my hand on a weapon?”

“We don’t have enough—” began Mitaka but Hux interrupted him.

“Of course not! You’re still our prisoner of war.”

Well, that was the answer she had expected. But it never hurt to ask.

They moved to the door and as before, Hux was taking point, Rose was behind him, then Mitaka and NK. Hux listened closely but there was no sound aside from their breathing. He unlocked the door and waited until it had slid open before he peeked into the hallway right and left. He started to creep forward, into the dimly lit hallway. The mere sight of the black tunnel made Rose’s palms sweaty. Calm, she had to keep calm, she had to control her breathing.

They moved silently down the hallway until they reached a colossal entrance nearby. It led to a large room with dozens of long tables and chairs— the mess hall. Some of the chairs were knocked over but there was no trace of a living being. There were dark glistening pools on the floor, probably blood judging from the coppery smell in the air.

The floor was sticky and Rose chose not to think about what amount of blood would cause that effect. They reached the buffet counter when Hux lifted his hand, and they all froze. Rose squinted but she didn’t see anything, then she heard it. A very quiet sound could be heard, as if somebody was slapping barehanded on a piece of metal.

Hux craned his neck to look around the counter, then he made hand signs Rose again did not understand. She frowned a bit and leaned forward to see.

First she thought she saw a skinned corpse laying in front of what looked like a massive conservator but then it twitched and moved its mangled hand and put it softly on the metal door. On second look she saw that it was not one corpse but two, twisted into each other.

She pulled back and spotted NK slowly moving forward. From the looks of it, Hux and NK planned to attack the thing, maybe it would work? It was considerably smaller than the other monsters they had encountered but would their firepower be enough?

Hux showed three fingers, two and one- they readied their weapons and fired a series of shots into the twisting thing in front of them. The stench of burned meat rose to their noses as it stopped moving. Hux and NK hurried to the monster, training their weapons on it. It didn’t move, was it dead? Rose noticed a small window at the walk-in conservator. She tiptoed to have a look and took a sharp breath when she saw three human bodies laying on the floor—apparently frozen to death as they tried to hide.

A loud ‘clang’ could be heard and they all fell down on the floor, behind the counter. Kriff! Had the blaster fire alarmed another of these things?

Something moved through the room, pushing chairs aside, bumping into tables. Rose could hear whispers. Hux pointed towards the galley in the back and they moved forward, away from the lifeless corpse and whatever was chasing them.

Hux had already reached a work table with a pile of cans when Rose heard something click. And it wasn’t from the thing in the mess, it was much, much closer. Her heart skipped a beat; she snapped her head back and in this very moment Mitaka was grabbed by the previously lifeless thing. Its twisted grey arms and legs clasped around Mitaka’s leg and with a jerk it pulled him down on the floor. It kept clicking its teeth together, shoving its body forward as if it wanted to wrap itself around Mitaka.

NK jumped up and smacked the butt of her blaster rifle against the creature. With a hiss it let go of Mitaka. Rose grabbed him and tugged him away while NK kept hitting it. Hux hurried back and helped Rose drag Mitaka further away until he stumbled to his feet.

NK grit her teeth, grabbed a bottle from one of the tables and hurled it at the creature. The bottle broke, coating the thing in what looked like oil. NK started shooting at it, one of the plasma shots ignited the oil and suddenly fire broke out. The creatures squealed and started to thrash uncontrollably around it. NK spat at it and yelled “Die you dirty son of a hutt!”

Hux grabbed her by her upper arm and literally jerked her away. The clanking of the chairs in the mess grew louder, faster.

They ran through the galley, Mitaka was limping. Rose could see a tear in his uniform pants. “NK-9554, take point. I’ll cover us,” yelled Hux.

NK did as she was told, Rose stayed close to Mitaka to make sure that he wasn’t falling behind. The fire suppression system kicked in and the sprinkler in the kitchen started to spray water.

The water drenched them in a matter of seconds, Rose almost slipped but was caught by Hux who almost bumped into her. They hurried towards the door in the back and escaped in the next hallway. Hux let the door slide shut and frantically entered the code to shut it for good. Before he could enter the last number, something banged against the door, causing him to stumble backwards.

Rose tried to gather her bearings to see where— kriff there was another creature just about twenty meters away. Hux wanted to enter the last digit but Rose realised that it was too late. She grabbed his greatcoat and jerked him away, screaming. “Run!”

Mitaka was already hobbling down the hallway, away from the creature who shrieked something intelligible. He was getting slower despite his best efforts. NK cursed under her breath, shoved her blaster rifle in Rose’s hands and picked Mitaka up, throwing him over her shoulder.

“Left,” screamed Hux. NK ran to the next door on the left with Mitaka on her back while Rose and Hux provided fire cover. The blaster rifle was heavy, and its knock-back made it hard for Rose to aim.

Rose’s eyes went wide when the blaster shot barely slowed the thing down. It was now in range and swatted at them with something that looked like a leg. Hux pushed her away and was struck on the chest; he fell backwards. Rose stared wide-eyed as the thing closed in on Hux.

Kriff! Kriff this thing! With a scream she stepped in front of Hux and lifted the heavy blaster rifle and started to shoot right into the thick middle of the creature, blood and gore splattered on her face but she didn’t care, she kept firing.

Suddenly she was pulled backwards and before she knew what was happening, she had been hauled into an office room. The door slid shut and locked itself immediately.

She stared at the metal door, her lungs burning from the exertion and cold air, her clammy fingers were still gripped around the blaster rifle so hard that her knuckles had turned white. The thing outside was howling and pounding against the enforced steel, making her tremble.

NK crouched down next to her and put her hand on her shoulder. “Give me the rifle, Sergeant.”

Rose stared at her, unable to control her breathing. “It— it kept coming right at us! I shot and—”

“It’s alright,” said NK in a quiet voice. She put her right hand on the rifle and simply took it away.

Rose was still trembling but only after a few seconds she realised that it was because of her wet clothes and the cold air.

“Lay still, Lieutenant!”

She propped herself up and saw from the corner of her eye that Hux and NK were bent over Mitaka who was silently groaning. She joined them and gulped when she saw the nasty gash on Mitaka’s thigh. Hux was wrapping a piece of dark cloth around it.

“I’m sorry, sir,” panted Mitaka. “I wasn’t paying attention.” He looked very pale. How much blood had he lost? Or was it the coldness that made him look so sick?

“These are exceptional circumstances, Lieutenant,” said Hux. Small clouds of breath formed in front of his mouth. He was drenched too, his usually neatly coiffed ginger hair hanging into his face.

NK started to rub her limbs, rolling back her shoulders and starting to move a bit. It made sense, they had to keep their body temperature up. They wouldn’t make it far in those wet clothes. She had to find a way to dry them or to warm up.

Rose got up and walked through the office, looking left and right. There were a lot of holo stations, considering this was some Internal Security office it wasn’t surprising—surely they monitored everything. If only the power were on they could use the equipment to see where the monsters were.

She sat down on one of the chairs and stared at the holo in front of her. Hm, LED-based microprocessor holos. She checked their base and noticed that they had portable battery slots on their heavy base, probably a left over from when they were used as mobile transmitters.

If she were some stuck-up Internal Security officer, where would she put the spare battery she would probably never use? Her sight fell on the drawer on her left and when she pulled it open, she saw the dark grey battery sitting in the neatly sorted drawer. She allowed herself a smile.

She quickly went from drawer to drawer until she had gathered twelve batteries, proudly she hauled her bounty back to the others.

Hux looked up from Mitaka and blinked in surprise. “What—”

“We got lucky for once. I guess we could use eight of them to activate the temperature control and the rest of them to power up one of these holos. Provided we can reroute the security system so that we can activate the surveillance cameras.”

Hux rubbed his chin. “CCTVs run on double-coded AX-router, but with my access codes it should be possible to divert some emergency power to some of them.”

Rose nodded. “Sounds like a plan, I’ll take care of the temperature and you can have a look at the holos.”

She rubbed her hands together and went to the temperature control panel, it took a few tries before she managed to rip the cover off, but when she saw the colourful wiring running through the wall she knew it would be easy to rig the temperature control to heat up the room, all she needed was rewiring one or two cables, bypass the auxiliary systems and hook the batteries up. Of course it wouldn’t last long but it might be enough for them to get warm. Hm, she could overclock the heating elements with a few simple adjustments. They would burn out faster but it didn’t matter—they had to move sooner than later.

She breathed on her cold hands and got to work.


	3. Osmosis

Rose draped the moist uniform jacket over one of the chairs and rubbed her arms as she paced back and forth. It was slowly getting warmer, but it was still freezing. NK did the same. Hux sat in front of one of the holos, trying to link up with the sub-system.

“Stars, just watching you makes me feel cold,” said Rose. “Don’t you want to warm up, Hux?”

“That—that’s General Hux to y—you, Rebel Scum,” whispered Mitaka.

“The link-up is almost finished,” said Hux without looking at her.

Rose crouched down and felt up Mitaka’s face. “You’re ice cold.” She rubbed her hands together and put them on his cheeks, trying to warm him up.

NK knelt next to him and checked his wound. “You will be fit for service in no time, Lieutenant.”

Was this all they could think of? Returning to ‘service’? She once more rubbed her hands together and put them on his face, then around his cold neck. “We should get rid of his wet uniform.”

“Agreed.” NK started to unbutton the uniform jacket. Rose opened the belt and hesitated for a moment before she unzipped his pants to pull them down. She struggled a bit to take off his boots and his pants but finally she managed and draped them over a chair. Then she returned and started to rub Mitaka’s pale, skinny legs. NK was doing the same with his arms and his chest.

Hux joined them and put his hand on Mitaka’s forehead. “Report, Lieutenant.” His voice sounded soft.

“S—Sir, I’m experiencing pain in my leg and I’m cold.”

“I see.” Hux got up and took his greatcoat off; he covered Mitaka with it.

“General, you w—will—”

“Don’t worry about me, Lieutenant. I barely feel the cold.”

Rose saw goosebumps on Hux’s arms; he was only wearing a black t-shirt now. He frowned a bit as he inspected Mitaka’s wounds. If she didn’t know better, she would have thought that Hux cared about his subordinate. She didn’t know what she expected in a situation like this, but it certainly wasn’t that he would surrender his greatcoat to a mere Lieutenant.

She got up and went to the holo. Hux had managed to set up the link; she saw a blueish-hazy live feed from the hallway. The thing was still lingering in front of the door, next to it was another, smaller creature. It was dragging its twisted body forwards away from the bigger one. Stars, how many of these things were there?

They wouldn’t make it. _She_ wouldn’t make it. Rose buried her face in her hands. Where was Rey? Rey could do it. She was a real hero, not just some grease monkey. Rose was tired, cold, and desperate; tears started to burn in her eyes.

Wait, there was no need to despair. She blinked the tears away and sniffed. She just had to find Rey, and everything would be alright! She pulled the keyboard closer and started to type, switching from camera to camera.

“What are you doing?” asked Hux close to her ear.

She flinched. “Kriff Hux! Way to give me a cardiac arrest!” He was hovering over her shoulder; she could smell his after-shave. She scooted away. “I’m trying to find my Jedi friend.”

Hux would probably sneer at her, tell her that she was a pathetic—

“Any luck?”

“Uh, no.” She chewed on her lips. “Look, I know that it’s silly. The ship is huge, and I can’t possibly find her by switching through the cams on this deck. So, you just go ahead and say it: ‘Insufferable Rebel Scum, clinging to false hope’.”

Something twitched in the corner of his mouth. “At least you have a leader you can cling to.”

“So, you think that Kylo Ren won’t be any help if he were alive?” She turned to stare at the holo again, switching through the feeds. “I thought you would worship your Supreme Leader even in his absence.”

He sat down in the chair next to her. “Ren is useless,” he said in a quiet voice. “Always chasing after some Sith relic, wasting our resources for mystical nonsense.”

“Well, that nonsense has taken over your ship, Hux.”

He was quiet for a few moments. “All these men and women under my command, dead because of Ren... I don’t expect you to understand, Sergeant, but they’re my responsibility—not Snoke’s, not Ren’s—they are _my_ soldiers. I’m their General and I expect them to follow my orders, just like they can expect me to avoid needless bloodshed.”

She frowned. “You mean to tell me that you actually care about them?”

“I do.”

Maybe he really did. After all, he was concerned about Mitaka. He had allowed NK to get rid of her white armour, had given away his jacket and his greatcoat… there was more to him than she had thought. “I didn’t think that you did.”

He hesitated. “I need you to understand that I’m committed to stop whatever is going on. With any means necessary.”

She ceased switching through the cams, staring at the empty hallway in front of her. “I know.”

“You do?”

“You said it yourself, this ship will rendezvous with other ships. I have no clue what is going on, but I know that we can’t unleash it on the galaxy.” She turned to face him again. “So yes, Rey will help you.”

“I wasn’t asking—”

“Yes, you were.” She resumed clicking through the feeds. “I just need to find her.”

“Stop interrupting me,” hissed Hux. “I wasn’t asking for the Scavenger’s help. I need _your_ help.”

Her eyes went wide. “What?”

“Wars aren’t won by the _Force_! They are won by soldiers, who fight bloody, dirty wars. People like me, people like you.”

Rose scoffed. “What a load of banta shit! The Old Empire was defeated by Luke Skywalker!”

Hux grimaced. “The Old Empire was defeated because it failed to become something else than a cult! The First Order was supposed to be different! It was supposed to be built on reason and—” he broke off. “It doesn’t matter.”

She had never anticipated that Hux thought himself as an idealist. She had really underestimated him.

He took a breath. “Whatever happens here can’t be fixed by the Force, Sergeant. I assure you that it can only be stopped by the four of us.”

“I still think our best shot is to find Rey.”

Hux exhaled. “Suit yourself; we need to rest up anyway. But I think you’re wasting your time.” He rose and joined the others. Rose heard him inquire after Mitaka’s condition.

Rose breathed on her fingers to warm them up and continued to look for Rey. After a few minutes, she froze when one of the feeds showed a field of green for a fraction of a second. Rose blinked and rubbed her eyes. Stars, she was really getting tired. As she continued to switch through the feed, the field appeared again. The Holo was like a viewing window on another planet, everything was green and lush. High grass swayed in the wind. The sun shone bright and friendly.

She gaped at it. What the— it was the field from her meditation. She zoomed in, yes, no doubt about it. It was the same field she had imagined. But how was it possible— her thoughts stopped when she saw a lone figure standing in the field.

She zoomed further in. She recognized the white robe and the brown hair buns—the figure standing with her back to her. It was Rey, it had to be. It became hard to focus her thoughts.

“Rose,” whispered a voice in her ear. “Rose…”

She leaned forward to hear better. “Rey?”

“Don’t worry, Rose. Everything is going to be fine.” Rey was slowly turning around, a smile on her lips. “I’ll fix everything.”

Rose beamed at her. “Rey! I need you! We need you!” Something tugged at the corners of her mind, but she pushed it away. Rey was here! She was safe, she would make sure that nobody had to die anymore!

“Of course, you need me, Rose.” Rey’s smile grew wider. “The Force is with me and there is nothing I can’t do.”

Rose rubbed over her eyes, but the fog in her brain didn’t lift. Something was off, but she couldn’t remember what. She felt warm and fuzzy.

From far away she heard a male voice. “Ser… Sergeant…” Something warm and firm was on her shoulder. She tried to shrug it off, but it wouldn’t go away. Something jerked her around and the first thing she saw was Hux’s face. The field and Rey were gone.

“Sergeant!”

She blinked slowly. “What?”

“Were you sleeping with your eyes open?” asked Hux with a crooked eyebrow. “You kept staring at the holo.”

Slowly the gears in her brain started to work. “The holo?”

He frowned. “Are you alright, Sergeant?”

She glanced at the holo, but it showed only an empty hallway. “I—” Had she fallen asleep? Had she dreamed about Rey? No, it made no sense. “I was staring at the holo?”

“Yes, you smiled, and I heard you mumble something. I assumed you found something.”

“What did you see in the holo?”

“This hallway,” he said and pointed at the holo.

He hadn’t seen anything. A shiver ran down her spine. That meant Rey had reached out to her through the Force. She hadn’t known that it was even possible. “I guess…. I must have fallen asleep after all,” she lied.

Hux sighed and left again. She watched him rub his naked arms. She stretched her back and got up to check on Mitaka. He was asleep; NK sat in the corner and had her eyes closed. She lifted Hux’s greatcoat and checked Mitaka’s temperature; he was a lot warmer than before. Only now she realised that it was already warmer in the room.

She put the coat back down and stared at the silver stripes on one of the sleeves. It was the same she had on the jacket Hux had given her. She glanced at Hux, the black tattoos on his forearm matched the silver insignia on the coat and the jacket. He had literally inked his rank onto his skin. She wasn’t sure if it was more frightening or more sad that he had dedicated himself with skin and hair to the Order.

Well, she had no time to muse about it. She felt up the jacket she had hung over the chair and realised that it was almost dry. Hux stopped his pacing and sat down in front of the holo, starting to check the feed.

What did Rey want her to do? Provided it had been some kind of vision… should she just stay here and wait for her to take care of everything? She was the hero after all.

Perhaps it was for the best. She sat down next to Hux and watched him take notes on a small pad. “You trying to map out where those creatures are?”

“We still need to get to the secondary bridge,” he suppressed a yawn.

“How late is it anyway?”

“It’s 20:03 Standard Galactic Time,” replied Hux and blinked a few times. “It’s odd that I would be tired at this time.”

She shrugged. “Well, I guess we’re all beat.”

“I’m aware but my stim should be good for another three hours.”

“Stim?”

He glanced shortly at her. “Working for the Order requires constant attention.”

Stars, no wonder that he looked like death warmed over. “Yeah, but stims? I— whatever.” Why was she even asking? He was more machine than man, a mindless drone in the service of a madman.

“I prefer Tarine tea to stims to be honest,” said Hux quietly.

Rose blinked in surprise. Was Hux making small-talk? “Uh, well. In my opinion caf is better.” Her sight fell on his tattoo. “So, what’s with the tattoos?”

He turned to face her, putting his right hand on his left arm, partly covering the black stripes up. “It’s nothing.”

“I noticed that they mirror the stripes on your uniform. What are they? General stripes?”

He exhaled. “Very astute. I was very proud when I received my commission, I thought I might as well commemorate the occasion.”

“Nobody can take that from you, huh? Not when it’s written on your very skin.” She reached for her Otomok medallion. “Perhaps I should consider getting a tattoo for myself.”

“Your insight is impressive, Sergeant,” said Hux in a quiet voice. He licked his lips. “What kind of tattoo do you want?”

She shrugged. “Maybe a snowgrape leaf like on my medallion.” She pulled it out from under her shirt and showed it to him.

“Ah, it’s the medallion you wore on the _Supremacy_. What meaning does it hold? If memory serves you were ready to pawn it off to the dirty slicer.”

She blinked in surprise. “I didn’t think that you would even remember it. Or me, for that matter.”

Hux frowned. “Of course, I remember.” He turned to face the holo again. “How could I not?”

Rose exhaled. She remembered how Hux had sneered at Finn and her before he gave the order to execute them. “It’s not every day where you give the order to chop off heads I guess.”

He glanced at her. “In hindsight it was a mistake. I apologize.”

“Uh, what was?”

“You are clearly a very skilled and knowledgeable engineer. It would have been a waste to kill you.”

What the— Hux must be more exhausted than he let on. Why else would he tell her such obvious lies? Perhaps he was trying to manipulate her somehow? “Uh, I’m glad too that my head is still on my shoulders.”

Hux continued to work. He blinked slowly, he looked as if he would fall asleep any second now. Suddenly, his eyes tore open and stared at the holo. Rose frowned and leaned in to have a look at what Hux was seeing. From the corner of her eye, she saw something bolt out of sight.

“Did you see that?” she asked. “It was moving faster than—” Her sight fell on Hux. He was staring straight ahead with an empty gaze.

Something wasn’t right. Had she been like that before? She put her hand on his arm and squeezed it. “Hux? Snap out of it.”

He was moving his lips, but no sound came out of them. His eyes became moist. A single tear ran down his cheek. She shook him but he kept staring straight ahead. Something was definitely off! She grabbed the batteries powering the holo and disconnected them.

The holo feed cut out and Hux gasped. He blinked tears away and turned to face her; a range of emotion passed over his face; he buried his face in his hands.

She crouched down in front of him, still holding his arm. “What happened?”

He took a few deep breaths. “I don’t know.”

Rose hesitantly petted his arm. “Did you see something?”

He grabbed her hand in a firm grip and stared at her with desperation in his pale green eyes. “I think it was Ren. He showed me… things.”

She pulled her hand away and rubbed her wrist. Had Hux had a vision too? Was Ren trying to contact him the same way Rey had contacted her? What the kriff was going on?

“I apologize, Sergeant. I didn’t mean to—” he broke off, looking at her with something akin to longing in his eyes.

“Okay, you’re freaking me out. What did you see?”

He blushed and averted his gaze. “Just made-up pictures and sounds.”

It sounded a bit like her vision. She cleared her throat. “Listen, I wasn’t completely honest with you before. I think Rey reached out to me when I looked at the holo—at first I thought that it had been a dream but if Ren reached out to you too we have to tell each other what’s going on.” She cleared her throat. “I’ll go first: Rey was standing in a field and told me that everything was fine, and she was going to fix it.”

Hux pressed his lips together and ran his hand through his hair, but he stayed silent.

“Well? It’s your turn.”

He looked at her with a softness that made her stomach drop. Why was he looking at her like that?

“He showed me what could have been and told me that everything was over, that it was futile to continue to struggle against the inevitable.”

“That’s the exact opposite of what Rey said,” stammered Rose. “That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Sir, requesting to speak freely,” said NK, she rose from her corner and rolled her shoulders back.

“Permission granted,” said Hux with a firmer voice than before. He was visibly pulling himself together and sat up straighter.

“Sir, with all due respect—since when do you care what Supreme Leader Ren is telling you?”

Hux jumped on his feet. “How dare—”

She lifted her chin and snapped at attention. “He is an absent leader, sir. Everyone knows that you are calling the shots. He is brooding in his chambers while there is a war going on! While my siblings in arms fight and die, he’s chasing after some _woman_!”

“It’s not your place to have an opinion on high command!” snapped Hux with barely hidden anger.

“I don’t care! Don’t listen to _him_! You never have and you shouldn’t start now! He is a liar and has no honour!”

Hux became very still. “There is no such thing as honour.”

NK stared at him. “Of course there is, loyalty and honour exists! That’s all we have.”

“I don’t have any honour or loyalty, Private,” said Hux in a quiet voice.

Rose huffed. “Right, that’s why you checked on Mitaka.”

NK nodded. “The Rebel is right, sir. You stood by us on Quesh in the acid mines, General Mohrsa stayed on his command ship, ordering us to take the mines despite—”

“That’s quite enough,” said Hux loudly.

“Yes, sir.”

He straightened his T-shirt. “I will overlook this lapse of discipline for once, NK-9554.”

“Sir.”

Rose looked from NK to Hux and back again. There were obviously more layers to NK than she had thought — she wasn’t just a brainwashed soldier. She saw herself as a fierce and loyal warrior. And she had opinions about her superiors.

Hux tugged at his black leather glove with resolve. “We have a mission, and we will fulfill it.”

Rose put her hands on her hips and exhaled. What a day—now even Hux was starting to make sense! Of course, she couldn’t stand back and wait for Rey to carry the burden all by herself! She might not be a hero who wielded the Force, but she could still do her part!

“How is Lieutenant Mitaka?” asked Hux, clasping his hands behind his back.

“He is stable but has developed a fever, the blood loss is substantial and the last time I checked the wound is already inflamed.”

Rose crouched down and checked on the injury herself. NK was right of course, the wound was radiating heat and flesh around the wound was red and swollen. “That’s odd, it shouldn’t have inflamed so fast.”

NK nodded. “It’s unusual, we can only assume that the creature was poisonous.”

Rose kneaded her neck. There was so much information that gave her a headache—how in the galaxy did it all fit together? Well, there was no way that she could figure it out, best to just stick to the plan. “Okay, how do we get to the bridge?”

Hux cleared his throat. “We can leave through the backdoor. I didn’t see any creatures in the hallway when I last checked the CCTV.”

“Should we have another look?” asked Rose.

Hux slowly nodded. “NK-9554, you will check the hallway via holo.”

Rose had to agree, if NK had vision too it would help them gather further empirical data over what was happening. If not… well, that meant that there was a reason why she and Hux were seeing Rey and Ren.

Rose connected the batteries with the holo and watched it flicker to life. NK sat down and began to work. Meanwhile she and Hux started to dress up Mitaka in his uniform. From time to time Mitaka’s eyes fluttered open but he seemed out of it.

Rose couldn’t help but notice how gently Hux dressed his subordinate. He took care to button his uniform jacket up, without doubt so that it was according to regulation.

From time to time she glanced at NK; she seemed fine. Rose didn’t know if she was supposed to be worried or relieved. If she survived this horror, she really needed to talk to General Organa to get her to explain how, what and kriffing why things happened with the Force.


	4. Syncytium

“Report, NK-9554,” said Hux.

NK sat up straighter in the chair. “Sir! The route to the secondary bridge seems clear. But I couldn’t discern a pattern in the creature's movements.” She scrolled through her notes. “In our vicinity are three creatures, the two on our front door and one lurking in sector B-98. May I add an observation, sir?”

“Permission granted.”

She grimaced. “Before we thought that those beasts are slow or passive, but they got faster, more aggressive. And those bastards pop up anywhere. We should expect a fight before we reach our goal.”

Rose cautiously glanced at the holo, all she could see was the two creatures lurking in front of the door. No fields, no Rey. She averted her eyes to be safe.

“I agree, NK-9554,” said Hux. “We need to move cautiously and monitor the situation.” He looked at Rose and quickly averted his gaze. In the past ten minutes she had caught him looking at her from time to time. Probably he was already planning to get rid of her once she wasn’t useful anymore.

“What about Mitaka?” asked Rose. “He obviously can’t walk on his own.”

NK glanced at her, probably judging her tiny frame. Either Hux or NK had to carry him, Rose was a bad shot, but she couldn’t possibly move him.

Hux drew breath to say something when they heard a door behind them slid open. Rose felt her stomach drop and she swirled around her own axis.

Mitaka had somehow managed to get up and had limped to the door, unlocking it. His face was pale and covered in sweat. His eyes were glassy and absent, looking at the twisted, bloody creature in front of him without seeing it.

“Zala? Is that you?” he asked in a brittle voice.

The thing before him was a mess of twitching flesh, arms and fingers moving. Two heads with empty eyes lolled from one side to another. One head clicked with its teeth, hissing something.

“Zala…” mumbled Mitaka and reached out to the creature.

Hux sprinted to the door and tried to close it, but it was already too late. The creature had already moved over the threshold, its countless limbs were propelling it towards Mitaka who stood there staring into the distance.

NK brushed past Rose and grabbed Mitaka by his shoulders, dragging him away. Hux pulled his blaster and fired at the beast, but it only started to thrash around, shrieking. They had to flee now!

Hux shoved his blaster into Rose’s hands and lifted Mitaka with a groan, throwing him over his shoulder. NK had already taken point and hurried towards the backdoor. Rose kept shooting at the creature, but she missed more often than she hit.

She screamed in frustration. By the seven gates of chaos! Why was she so damn useless!

They ran out of the room and Rose locked the door behind her. She almost stumbled as she ran after Hux. Mitaka was groaning and wailing.

Stars! He would draw attention—as if on cue she heard several heavy footsteps and something akin to fingernails scratching over metal behind her. She didn’t dare to look—there was nothing she could do anyway. They had to get to the secondary bridge!

NK had already reached it; she stood by the door, aiming at something behind Rose. She could swear she felt a hot breath on her neck but that had to be her imagination.

“Sarge, duck!” screamed NK suddenly and Rose let herself fall. She felt something brush over her head and the creature behind her shrieked, a spray of cold, viscous liquid covered Rose and she stumbled again on her feet and ran into the second bridge. Behind her she heard the door hiss and a storm of angry hits drummed on the metal door. They heard the creature shriek and hiss loudly before a squelching sound could be heard. All was silent after that.

Rose stared at the door; her heart was hammering against her chest. Kriff! That hadn’t been a creature! This was something entirely else, faster, even more vicious.

“Rose! Are you alright?” Hux helped her up. “Are you hurt?”

Only now she realised that she was covered in gore and blood. “It’s—it’s fine,” she stammered. “It didn't get me.”

Mitaka lay on the floor, whispering something intelligible. NK stood next to him with her blaster rifle, eyeing him with suspicion.

“It was the black creature,” she said, “it appeared out of nowhere and lifted one of its claws, arms… whatever.”

“Kriff!” panted Rose. “It almost got me.” She locked her eyes on NK. “You— you saved my life.”

NK frowned but didn’t say anything.

Only now she realised that Hux was still holding her upper arm as if he wanted to steady her. He, too, seemed to notice and withdrew his hand.

He cleared his throat and looked down on Mitaka. “Lieutenant? Can you hear me?” He crouched down and pulled the torn trouser leg up, revealing a swollen, red infection. Rose shuddered when she saw something move under his skin, like a thick little bulge. NK grabbed Mitaka’s leg right above the bulge and gritted her teeth as she tried to squeeze it out.

The bulge moved a bit and started to slip away. Stars! It looked like it was trying to crawl up Mitakas leg! Rose felt a little sick. “What the kriff is that?”

“Nothing good,” said NK, “it feels hard and soft. We should get rid of it ASAP!”

Hux suddenly had a knife in his hand, and with one long slice he cut the bulge open. Mitaka screamed and howled but was too weak to defend himself. Something fell out of the wound on the floor and wiggled like a worm. Rose saw a piece of fingernail amid the bloody mess. Stars, it was a finger from the monster that had grabbed Mitaka! Hux stomped it with the heel of his boot, leaving a stain on the otherwise spotless floor.

“Kriff,” hissed NK and let go of Mitaka’s leg. There were at least two other things moving up his leg, one just disappeared above his thigh.

Hux cleaned his knife on Mitaka’s trousers and slid it back under his sleeve. “NK-9554, restrain the Lieutenant and guard him.”

“Yes, sir!” She disappeared in the back of the room and appeared with a pair of binders.

Rose took a look around, it didn’t look like any of the bridges she had been to. There were only two chairs in the middle of the room, surrounded by holoscreens.

She let her hand glide over the smooth consoles. ZKnse-230 interface… she hadn’t even known that they were beyond the prototype phase.

Hux sat down in one of the chairs, typing something on the console. Seconds later the room lit up in a bright light.

Rose looked around and saw everywhere slick, new tech she had never even dreamed about. If not for the circumstances she would have been awed. “Is this a closed system?”

“It is, Sergeant. The bridge has a similar system, of course, but since we can’t get there, we have to steer the ship from here.”

Rose gulped. “Steer? Where to?”

Hux chewed on his lower lip. “Into the next sun, I’m afraid.”

“What? What happened to the plan to reactivate the system and chase the creatures off with light and heat?”

Hux blinked slowly. “You know that won’t be possible after what we have seen.”

She knew, of course she had known the moment when she had realised how many of these creatures were there, and that was before they had realised that the creatures could somehow control Mitaka. Control… wait a moment— this wasn’t simple control. It had mind-tricked him!

Rose collapsed on the floor. Everything but this, please. The Force, any deity… please not this.

Hux put his hand on her shoulder. “Are you feeling ill?”

The concern in his voice made her heart ache. Stars help her, they really were the only ones who could still stop this! A First Order General, a chubby grease monkey and a brainwashed soldier.

She sniffled. “It’s… I just realised that you were right. The Force users can’t help us, they are the ones causing all this.”

“What?” asked NK.

“It all started when Ren used this Sith relic. Nobody has seen him or Rey—instead there were these monsters who could read minds, who could whisper suggestions, like—” she broke off, she couldn’t say it.

Hux averted his gaze. “It doesn’t matter.”

Rose grabbed her medallion. He was right, it didn’t matter. She knew that there was only one thing to do—to stop whatever was lurking on this ship. “I’ll man the navigation.”

Hux nodded. “Agreed, I’ll take the helm.”

Rose hurried to her station and quickly plotted a course to the nearest sun. Hux sat down at the controls and activated the thrusters, bringing the ship about. In the holographic viewport the sun became visible.

“Bearing 40.76, -73.984, inputting it now.” She activated the route on the nav. A red warning flashed up ‘collision course’. She typed quickly to override it, slicing the security system. With a lump in her throat she saw the red warning fade.

“Bearing 40.76, -73.984,” repeated Hux and typed something on his console. Another warning appeared on the holo screen: ‘Invalid course’. He hesitated for the shortest moment before he overrode the system with what she assumed were his command codes.

Mitaka was groaning, mumbling something Rose didn’t quite catch. She glanced at him; he looked beyond pale, his face was greyish and drool dripped out of his mouth, his eyes were glassy.

Hux leaned back and exhaled. “It’s done.”

Rose gulped but the lump in her throat didn’t go away. “ETA in three hours, 13 minutes,” her voice sounded raspy.

NK looked from Hux to Rose and back again. “That’s it? That’s all it took?”

Rose wiped over her face. “You sound like Poe. Are you disappointed that there was no big bang?”

“Well… yeah. I heard Vice Admiral Holdo went out like a badass—” She cleared her throat. “Apologies, sir.”

Hux scoffed. “I underestimated Vice Admiral Holdo, and it cost us dearly.” He lifted his gaze. “I underestimated the lot of you, Sergeant.”

“We kept telling you—we’re the spark that will light the fire that will burn the First Order down,” Rose said sadly. “Didn’t think it would be that literal though.” She looked again at the sun. Soon it would fill out the entire viewscreen. Would it hurt? Would it be hot. antagonizing or would they simply crashed on the surface of the gas giant?

NK put the heavy rifle on her shoulder like it didn’t weigh anything. “Still better than going out on some backwater planet, face in the dirt.” She gave Rose a lop-sided grin. “At least we get to fry these arseholes.”

Rose blinked tears away. “Yeah, we will.” Was this really it? They would crash and burn in the Outer Rim, nobody would ever find out what had happened to Rey and Kylo Ren. Would they assume they died fighting an epic fight? Lightsabers flashing, sparks flying?

She had believed that was how it would end. The hero fighting the good fight. Instead all there was were a few overwritten codes, the blinking of a holo screen. Perhaps NK was right: it was anticlimactic.

Hux crossed the room and crouched down next to Mitaka. “Lieutenant, can you hear me?”

Mitaka wiggled and groaned, his movements were erratic and twisted. His leg was looking worse by the minute, yellow pus was seeping out of the wound, small human fingers started to poke out through his skin like small spikes.

“S—sir?” he whispered. “General Hux? I’m s—sorry, sir. It got me— it got me because I didn’t pay enough attention.”

“Don’t worry about it, Lieutenant.” Hux said in a quiet voice.

Mitaka sniffled. “It hurts, it burns, sir.”

“I know.”

“My... my uniform... if— if I’m bound like this I can’t get it—” Mitaka whimpered, tears ran down his cheeks. “I wanted you to be proud of me, sir. I know that I wasn’t— I wasn’t—”

Hux straightened Mitaka’s uniform jacket, it was a vain gesture, of course, seeing as the uniform was bloody and crumpled. “Everything is according to regulation, Lieutenant.”

Mitaka blinked and tears ran down his cheeks. “Was I good enough, sir?”

Hux pulled the hidden knife out of his sleeve. “You were the best orderly I ever had, Dopheld.”

Mitaka smiled; he looked happy. “T—thank you, s—”

With one shift movement, Hux buried the blade in Mitaka’s chest. The man went limp from one second to another. Hux blinked a few times before he pulled the knife out. His breath was shaky.

***

Rose checked the screen of the nav computer. ETA 1 hours and 8 minutes. The creatures hissed, whispered and pounded at the door from time to time.

NK was busy cleaning the rifle for the third time; she looked like she was itching for a fight. Soon she would start doing push-ups again.

Hux on the other hand just stood in front of the viewport, staring at the sun which creeped closer and closer. The light of the holo highlighted his ginger hair and his sharp cheekbones. He was all edge, all rectangle uniform. And yet he had looked soft at times, how could someone be so harsh and soft at the same time?

She joined him in front of the viewport. “How long did you know Mitaka?”

“Five years.” He sighed. “He was soft, soft and weak.”

“He was your friend, wasn’t he?”

Hux chewed on his lower lip. “I guess he was. He was loyal.” He turned to face her. “The Scavenger is… was your friend too, right?”

Rose smiled sadly. “I like to think so. I admire her and she was so nice to me. She looks at me, a silly nobody, and I feel like she’s really seeing _me_.”

Hux opened his mouth and closed it again.

“What? No scathing remark on how sentimental Rebels are?” asked Rose quietly.

“I—I don’t think that you’re a nobody, Sergeant.”

“What?”

Hux straightened his back and clasped his hands behind his back. “You are a very resourceful engineer and a tenacious fighter.”

She snorted. “Yeah, right.”

He frowned. “You—you are Sergeant Rose Tico, you are _not_ a nobody! And you deserve better!”

Hux seemed almost angry, no, not angry… desperate. She squinted. “What the kriff are you going on about?”

“Nothing!”

She groaned in frustration. “Stars! Spit it out already! We’re going to die in an hour anyway!”

“I—”

“What? What is it? You want me to rot in some cell for all eternity? Is that what you call ‘better’?”

“Of course not! I don’t want you to die, Rose! I want you to move to Dantooine and start a repair shop! I want you to grow old among your loving family! And I want you—” he interrupted himself, panting and with tears glittering in his eyes.

Rose gaped at him. “How do you know about the repair shop? Only Paige knew—and why the kriff did you call me ‘Rose’?”

Hux ran his hand through his hair. “It’s what Ren showed me.”

She snorted. “That’s the horrible torture he put you through? You had to watch me open a shop?”

“ _We_ opened a repair shop on Dantooine,” Hux said so quietly that she almost didn’t hear it. He scoffed. “It felt so real, I felt the anger, the frustration when I was taken prisoner. I felt the heat of your plasma cutter when we worked on updating the targeting system on Poe’s fighter. I could feel the water sloshing around my feet when you taught me to swim. I felt your—” he broke off. “It all _felt_ so real. It _was_ real before he took it away.”

A shiver ran down her spine. She and— no, that couldn’t be. Rose gulped. “But it wasn’t real, you know that, right?”

He laughed joylessly. “Of course, I know. He was just being cruel.”

She watched him squirm under her gaze. He was embarrassed, and why wouldn’t he be? Ren had shown him some impossible fantasy with _her_ of all people. She could feel heat crawl up her cheeks. He just wanted to humiliate Hux, show him that he was only good enough for a chubby mechanic.

She couldn’t help but feel bad for him. He was her enemy, a man who had waged war against freedom itself and— and stars help her, she still felt bad for him. No, she wasn’t feeling bad for ‘General Hux’, she was feeling bad for the human being in front of her. A man who cared about his subordinates. A man who could be kind and considerate even when he didn’t have to.

She tore her gaze away from Hux and stared into the sun on the screen. In the end they were all human beings… she turned to face NK who was still cleaning her rifle. She couldn’t let any more human beings die.

Rose straightened her back and went to the main console. They had come this far! She wouldn’t let them die— _she_ wouldn’t die here. Her hands flew over the keyboard and she scoured the system for emergency power lines.

NK took note of her frantic search. She came closer and leaned over the backrest of the chair Rose was sitting on. “What are you up to?”

“I just remembered that the First Order runs on a PABR network, it’s state of the art tech because its isolinear chips are running on layers and layers of subroutines, making it faster than any other system.”

“So?”

Rose kept typing. “And under all these layers are manual overrides because the system is designed to keep running no matter what.”

Hux drew nearer. “I fail to see your point. Even with- oh, _oh_.”

Rose nodded. “Exactly. We don’t need to power the whole ship to get out of here. All we need is access to an escape pod. We can launch it manually even if the things out there are sapping all the energy.”

“I didn’t see it because I—”

“—because you didn’t even think of running away and letting the monster take your precious ship, huh?” Rose gave him a thin smile. “We are no heroes, Hux. We are just regular people and regular people are allowed to run and hide.” She locked her eyes again on the screen before her. “Ah, found it.”

NK glanced over Rose’s shoulder. “Stars, the escape pod isn’t even that far away from here.”

Hux stared at her with awe. “You are brilliant!”

“Not really, it’s just a simple deduction.” She stared at the layout in front of her. “It’s 200 meters from our door to the pod. I hope you guys are good runners.”

NK cocked her rifle. “Let me handle the monsters, sir.”

Hux tugged at his black leather glove. “You can’t stop them, Trooper. There is no need to risk your life in a pointless fight.”

Rose nodded. “I agree, if anything we have better chances to reach the pod if we provide multiple targets to the black thing.” She felt a shiver run down her back. Hux and NK could make it, they were both taller and faster than she was. Well, at least she would fight before her end.

Perhaps that was all she could ask for. To die with her head held high.

Hux checked the chronometer. “ETA in 32 minutes. We need to get going if we want to escape the gravitational pull from the sun.”

NK shouldered her rifle. “Well, then, sir. Let’s show that black beast what we’re made of.”

“Indeed,” said Hux with the thinnest smile on his lips. “There is no rest for the wicked.” He pulled his blaster out of his holster.

Rose felt the palms of her hands get sweaty as she approached the door. It was eerily quiet outside.

“I’ll take point and shoot everything that stands in our way,” said NK and brushed Rose gently aside. “Stand back, Sergeant.”

Rose felt Hux’s hand on her shoulder. Its warmth calmed her down a bit; at least she wasn’t alone.

NK pushed the door open and jumped out, wildly looking around before starting to run towards the pod at the end of the hallway. Rose followed her, and as she ran, she heard a hiss behind her, she quickly glanced over her shoulder—the black monster was on the other end of the hallway, speeding towards them.

Hux and NK were fast and soon overtook her. Rose panted, small clouds of breath came out of her mouth, her lungs burned from the cold air. Hux and NK were pulling away, she could hear the monster closing in, its hisses and whispers growing louder by the second.

Hux glanced over his shoulder, he slowed his step and reached out to take her hand. NK was already at the pod, pulling the latch open.

They wouldn't make it. The monster would reach them before they could escape! Rose became very calm, she knew what she had to do. She would provide the distraction needed for Hux and NK to get away.

Hux’s eyes went wide when Rose slowed her step. Time seemed to freeze, Rose could see it clearly: NK who was gesturing to her to get into the escape pod, Hux’s horrified expression, his fluttering greatcoat as he spun around. NK who grabbed Hux and pushed him unceremoniously into the pod.

Rose took a shuddering breath and turned to face her doom. She grabbed her medallion as she saw the black monster rushing towards her, in the black fluttering cloud of black hair and dark grey fog she recognized a face. It was split in half by a dark red line that ran over its twisted, elongated visage. Eyes gleaming orange in the dark seemed to stare right into her soul.

Kriffing monster! If it wanted a fight it could have it! She lifted her chin, ripped the necklace from her neck and grabbed the medallion so hard in her fist that it hurt. She pulled her first back and when the creature was so close that it almost reached her with its long, black fingers and twisted limbs, she struck it.

Right before her fist made contact with it, the black monster was crushed against the wall by a large red creature with three heads and countless blood dripping limbs. She stared at the scene before her with eyes wide open.

She blinked and suddenly she wasn’t in the hallway anymore but on a wide field. Rey was standing in front of her, smiling at her. She was still wearing white robes.

“Rey?” Rose gulped. “I—what happened?”

Rey kept smiling but it wasn’t a happy smile, it was tormented. “Oh Rose. All those deaths…”

“It was Ren’s Sith relic, wasn’t it?”

Rey nodded. “The Force called out to us and we answered. Oh Rose, if you could only understand how connected everything is. How the whole galaxy is part of a magnificent whole.”

“Rey... Rey, we don’t have time for—”

“I told you: I will fix this.”

“Fix? You can’t—”

Rey's smile grew wider, it started to tear at the corners of her mouth, splitting them open. A single drop of blood ran down her chin. “I made Ren’s victims whole again.”

Realisation made Rose tremble. “You— you made them whole again? Did you bring them back to life?”

She nodded proudly. “I healed them. Finally, they are together, as a whole.”

Rose felt tears sting in her eyes. “You aren’t yourself, Rey. This is not who you are.”

The blood from her mouth started to drip on Rey’s white robes, leaving dark red stains. “What do you mean?”

“You are creating abominations, Rey. You are not saving them. Ren’s relic has done something to you both.”

She blinked in confusion. “What? No, no, I’m saving them.”

Rose took a step forward and grabbed Rey’s hands. “Listen to me, listen to my voice. I’m your friend and you can trust me. You need to stop.”

Rey’s smile widened. “But I have to save…” She trailed off and her unnatural grin faded a bit. “Rose? I’m feeling odd, I—” a shiver ran through her body. She grabbed Rose’s hands in return, her grip was hard and cold. “Don’t worry, Rose. I will save you too.”

Rose felt tears sting in her eyes. “Please, Rey.”

Rey nodded as her smile widened further into a deep wound. “I’m your salvation, Rose.” Blood started to seep out of her eyes.

Rose pushed her medallion into Rey’s hands and clasped her hands around Rey’s. She sniffled, this was it. This is how it would end. “It’s not your fault, Rey. I will always be your friend.”

Rey looked down on the medallion in her hand, then she raised her head, blood was now streaming from her eyes, like dark red tears. She looked desperate, haunted and still she kept smiling. In a quiet voice she whispered: “Run, Rose, please.”

The field and Rey disappeared and all she could see was a writhing mass of twisted arms, legs and flesh hovering before her. Innards were strung around it, oozing blood and pus. But it didn’t lunge at her.

“Rose!” screamed Hux from behind.

That made her snap out of her confused haze, she turned on her heel and sped towards the escape pod. “Go! Go!” she screamed.

NK was holding the latch open and Hux waved at her. “Hurry!”

Stars! Why hadn’t they left? She gritted her teeth and ran as fast as her legs could carry her. Behind her she heard fingernails scratch along the polished floor, raw flesh slapping on the hard surface. Heavy footsteps closed in on her, the whispers and the hisses grew louder.

She jumped and lunged into the escape pod. NK slammed the door to the escape pod shut right before the creature reached them. Hux pulled the manual override lever down and with a small bang the escape pod was shot into space.

Rose stared at the giant hot sun visible through the small porthole. They were speeding away from the ship. She gulped as she watched the destroyer slowly steer towards the sun. The bow started to glow red before the ship dove into the sun, melting down from bow to stern. For a moment, she thought she heard screams, whispers, voices begging her to help. Screams demanding vengeance, blood and murder. The ship broke apart and imploded before it vanished into the fiery giant. The voices fell silent.

Rose felt tears sting in her eyes. Out of habit, she reached for her medallion, but of course she had lost it. She clutched her chest. Kriff! She couldn’t even save the only thing that Paige had left her! She had let down Paige and she had left Rey to die. Her sisters… gone because of— something was glittering just above the steering joystick on the console.

She blinked. She could have sworn that it hadn’t been there mere seconds ago. She reached out and took the golden, no silver piece of jewellery. It was her medallion, the necklace was still broken but the half-moon shaped snowgrape leaf was unblemished by blood and gore.

She sniffled and pressed it against her chest. For a moment she thought she felt Rey’s hand on her shoulder. She hadn’t failed her, she had saved her from becoming something she wasn’t.

“Rose?” asked Hux. She wiped over her eyes and turned to face him. He sat on the pilot seat, a frown on his face. “Are you alright?”

She laughed and cried at the same time. “We made it, Hux. We stopped it and we saved them.”

“Saved them?”

She nodded and sniffled again. “It’s hard to explain, but I know we did.”

“Well, seeing as we’re drifting in a largely uninhabited Outer Rim sector with nothing but thrusters you will have a lot of time to explain it to us,” said NK from behind.

Rose gathered her bearing and checked the holo of the galaxy map. The next planet was lightyears away—she squinted her eyes: Corbos. She had never even heard of it.

Hux straightened his t-shirt and cleared his throat. “NK-9554?”

“Yes, sir?”

“I think we are going to need your skillset once we land on Corbos.”

She broke out in a wide grin. “Corbos? Awww, sir—you know how to please a woman.” She checked her blaster rifle and cocked it.

Rose smiled nervously. “What?”

“It’s a known den of bounty hunters and thieves, Sergeant,” said Hux with furrowed brow. “We have a long way ahead of us before we reach civilization.”

Rose let that sink in. He was right of course, they had no way of contacting anybody without a proper relay—and even if she did: Rose had no idea if the Rebels were still in their old hideout on Yavin 4.

She lifted her chin and tied the medallion back around her neck. “Do you have a spare hydro-spanner and a couple of NX-chips to spare, NK?”

“Yeah, I guess. Why?”

“How about we update that rifle of yours?” she asked with a small smile.

NK’s eyes began to glow with something that was either sheer happiness or insanity. Rose wasn’t sure which and she had to admit that she didn’t care.

Hux crooked an eyebrow. “Overclocking NX-chips to increase the blast intensity will shorten the life-span of the weapon as you well know.”

Rose mimicked his raised eyebrow. “You don’t say.”

Hux cleared his throat. “Unless someone would refit the plasma load of course.”

Stars, he really knew his tech. She felt herself blush against her will. Well, perhaps there were worse travel companions than a trigger-happy Stormtrooper and a brilliant, tech-savvy maniac. At least she wasn’t alone.

Rose adjusted the thrusters and plotted a course to Corbos. They had come this far, surely underworld scum was no match for them.

_The End_

**Author's Note:**

> I didn't come up with the idea of Hux having inked two black stripes on his arm - I saw Fanart with this cool design some time ago. If memory serves it was [Jeusus](https://jeusus.tumblr.com/) on Tumblr ^^


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